The Voyage of the Iron Dragon

by Robert Kroese

  When the weather abated the next morning, Ask took a look around and proclaimed that they had arrived in Iceland. Tharres, who was increasingly dubious of the coxswain’s expertise, had his doubts. These doubts were confirmed the next day, when Bruno’s men encountered the crew of a Norse ship who had been blown aground by the same storm. The men were friendly enough but unexpectedly well-disciplined for a Viking crew; their coxswain, a man name Jorgen, did most of the talking. Tharres, not wanting to spook the strangers, had hidden himself in the rocks while they were some distance off.

  Jorgen informed Bruno that they were in a place called Greenland. Jorgen’s crew intended to remain there until the winds were favorable again. As the storm had ceased and the winds were now strong out of the southwest, this caused some puzzlement among Bruno’s men: unless the Vikings intended to travel farther west, the wind was as good as it was going to get. Jorgen was pleasant but noncommittal in the face of their questions; he made it clear that although he had no room in his ship for more men, his crew would do what they could to repair Goldleaf’s mast. He even offered them some provisions, in case their voyage took longer than expected.

  Bruno had told him they were mercenaries on their way to take part in the fighting in Northumbria. If Jorgen was surprised they had gone so far off course, he didn’t show it. When he asked which side they intended to fight on in Northumbria, Bruno told him they hadn’t decided yet, provoking guffaws from Jorgen’s crew. These Norsemen apparently had no great affinity for the kinsmen fighting the Saxons. What drew Tharres’s attention, though, as he peered through a cleft in the rocks, was the item Jorgen pulled from his pocket as his men were leaving to return to their ship: Tharres couldn’t get a good look from his hiding place, but the way Jorgen glanced at it and then toward the horizon, he was almost certain it was a compass.

  The Norsemen embarked six days later, when the wind shifted again. They sailed southwest. Goldleaf’s mast had been repaired four days earlier, but Bruno, at Tharres’s urging, coached four of his men to feign illness, preventing them from departing for Northumberland. When the Viking ship’s sail was only half-visible over the horizon, Goldleaf set sail after it. By this time, Tharres had told Bruno and his men a very fragmentary and self-serving account of the Eidejelans, not unlike the one Gurryek, unbeknownst to Tharres, had told the Pope. The Eidejelans, Tharres explained, used occultic divination to locate gold deposits and other great wealth, which they would use to install a false Pope and establish a new Roman Empire under the control of the Antichrist. Bruno, Ask and the others became convinced that they were not only going to get very rich; they were going to save all of Christendom in the process.

  A key step in the process of establishing the reign of the Antichrist, Tharres told them, was to first establish dominion over an untamed land far to the west, rich in gold and populated by heathen savages. The Eidejelans would take advantage of the naivete of the savages, converting them to their cause through the teaching of a false gospel. They would create of the savages a great army that would sweep across Christendom, deposing the rightful rulers of Frankia, Saxony and Burgundy. Bruno’s men had been called to stop them and establish a new kingdom in the land across the sea, with Bruno as king.

  The truth was that Tharres had begun to doubt the veracity of the foreman’s claims about a secret stronghold in Iceland. The man had said a great many things under duress, most of which were so fanciful that Tharres had dismissed them out of hand. He began to wonder if the foreman had sensed that Tharres was receptive to the Iceland story and had seized on it as his only chance to make the pain stop. In contrast, Tharres had no doubt that Jorgen and his men were in the employ of the spacemen, and that they would lead him directly to one of their bases.

  For three days they followed the Vikings across the sea, often losing sight of the ship as it dipped below the horizon. It vanished for the last time the evening of the third day, and for another four days they sailed alone on the open sea. At last one of the men spotted land, and they sailed close to shore and then rowed south until they found a beach where they could land. They had barely dragged Goldleaf onto the beach when they were accosted by nearly naked men who emerged from the woods and surrounded them, jeering at them with strange cries and brandishing flint-tipped spears. Bruno and his men drew their swords, but Tharres urged them to remain calm. Unarmed, he took a step forward and removed his hood. The Indians gasped and fell back in fear. After a moment, one man dropped his spear and fell to his knees, prostrating himself before Tharres. Several others quickly did the same, and soon the entire group lay on the ground before him.

  “Tell your men to put away their weapons, Bruno,” Tharres said. “We find ourselves among allies.”

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Edward, King of the Saxons, sat on his horse at the crest of a hill overlooking the burning buildings of the village below. It was just past noon on a crisp Autumn day, the morning fog having given way to the gray haze of smoke from the Viking fortifications. Near the center of the village, a hundred or so men huddled together: this was where Edward’s troops had rounded up prisoners. Only a few corpses were visible from Edward’s vantagepoint, mostly Norsemen.

  The men of Wessex had come upon the Vikings at Lincolnshire suddenly just after dawn, slaughtering the watchmen before they could raise an alarm, and moving quickly to take control of key points in and around the town. It had been a skillfully executed assault, but their success was due as much to the sloppiness of the defenders. The Norsemen had traded raiding and adventure for a quiet life of farming in the English countryside, and now they were as vulnerable as the Saxons had been a few generations earlier. Edward smiled at the reversal: it had been a long time coming.

  Since the Danes first invaded the shores of Northumberland over a hundred years earlier, the rulers of Mercia and Wessex had resisted the advance of the Norsemen as best they could, but the invaders had been too numerous—and the defenders too scattered and disorganized—to forestall the conquest of most of Britain. The year Edward’s uncle, Æthelred, became king, the Great Heathen Army arrived and began its advance across the island, conquering Northumbria and East Anglia. Æthelred’s brother-in-law, King Burgred of Mercia, appealed to Æthelred for help against the Vikings. Æthelred and his brother, Alfred, led a West Saxon army to Nottingham, but were unable to oust the invaders, and Burgred was forced to buy off the Vikings. The invaders defeated Burgred and drove him into exile.

  The Vikings next turned their attention to Wessex. After several defeats, Æthelred died and was succeeded by his brother Alfred, because Æthelred’s sons were too young to take the throne. After Alfred defeated the Vikings at Edington, the Viking leader, Guthrum, accepted Alfred’s authority in Wessex. A compromise between the two leaders resulted in the Danelaw, the area of northern England in which Danish law held sway.

  Upon Alfred’s death, Edward, then twenty-five years old, succeeded to the throne and began his long struggle to take England back from the Norsemen. His cousin, Æthelwold, son of Æthelred, allied with the Danes against him, but was killed in battle. Now, eight years later, Edward had overseen his first great victory over the Norsemen, here in the Northumbrian county of Lincolnshire. He hoped this victory marked the turning of the tide against the Vikings in England.

  Hearing a horse approaching, Edward turned to see Ceolwulf, the leader of the Mercian army, coming up the path toward him. The Mercians had joined with the Saxons in the battle against the Danes; victory would have been impossible without Ceolwulf and his men. “We’ve taken the abbey,” Ceolwulf said. “The Danes we weren’t able to capture are on the run. Once we dig in, they’ll find it difficult to retake the town.”

  Edward nodded. “Very good, Ceolwulf. What of the bones?” The remains of Saint Oswald, who had been King of the Northumbrians shortly after the fall of the Roman Empire, were interred at the abbey in town. Retaking the Good King’s bones from the Norsemen had been a major motivation for this offensive.

  “W
e’ve confirmed the ossuary is inside,” Ceolwulf replied. “My knights are guarding the place. We’ll wait for a priest to arrive before moving the bones.”

  “There are no priests at the abbey?”

  “All fled before the battle, save one, and his loyalties are uncertain. In any case, he was wounded when one of my men mistook him for a Dane. I don’t think he’d survive the journey to Gloucester.”

  “You’re moving Oswald to Mercia?”

  “That was our agreement.”

  Edward nodded. “Indeed. You get your saint and I get Essex.”

  Ceolwulf frowned. “Oswald deserves better than to be a bargaining chip between kings.”

  “Forgive me, Ceolwulf. I’m a bit giddy. I suppose I never really believed this day would come.”

  “You require no forgiveness this day, Edward. You’ve done a great thing, uniting our people against the Danes. I only hope that your confidence in our future success is warranted.”

  “Perhaps the Good King will intercede for us, assuming your men treat him with the respect he deserves.”

  “We certainly endeavor to. There was another matter I wanted to bring to your attention.”

  “Yes?”

  “This priest, the one who stayed behind at the abbey. He’s an odd one.”

  “How so?”

  “When my knights entered the abbey, he ran toward them with a knife. There was no mistaking who we were. No Christian priest would think he was in danger from knights of Mercia.”

  “Perhaps he is not really a priest.”

  “He was wearing a priest’s robes and has the look of a Saxon. He has been muttering to himself in Latin since we captured him. This man—he calls himself Osric—is no Norseman.”

  “Is he mad? Why would an English priest attack Mercian knights?”

  “I think he wanted us to kill him. It would explain why he stayed behind when the other priests fled. He seems to be wracked with guilt about something. He keeps talking about ‘fiery missiles’ in the sky.”

  Edward groaned. “This again. The superstitions of fishermen.” Edward had received numerous reports over the past three years of fiery plumes ascending into the sky and disappearing. The reports had come mostly from the crews of fishing ships and sometimes shepherds on remote islands in the north. The plumes seemed to originate far out to sea, sometimes to the west, sometimes to the east, sometimes to the north. Speculation had arisen that the fiery missiles portended the end of the world. Having more pressing concerns to attend to, Edward hadn’t wasted any resources investigating the claims.

  “Some of my own men have seen them as well,” Ceolwulf said. “My cousin, Rowan, who is the nephew of the Count of Cheshire, claims to have seen a light, brighter than a star, streaking straight up into the sky. Rowan is as sober a man as I’ve come across, unlikely to be unsettled by a falling star.”

  “What was Rowan’s assessment of this omen?”

  “I don’t believe Rowan thinks it was an omen at all.”

  “He must have ascribed some importance to the event, or he would not have mentioned it to you.”

  Ceolwulf nodded. “Rowan thinks the missiles are a sort of weapon, like the flaming projectiles sometimes hurled into cities during a siege. Rowan thought they were perhaps testing these weapons at sea to avoid detection.”

  “A ship-based catapult?” Edward asked dubiously.

  Ceolwulf shook his head. “The way Rowan described it, the missile seemed to fly under its own power. It headed straight up, gathering speed as it went.”

  “Rowan is mistaken. An unliving thing flying under its own power is impossible.”

  “According to the teachings of our natural philosophers, yes. Have you heard the rumors of the Dvergar?”

  “Dwarves?” Edward. “This is hardly the time for jokes, Ceolwulf.”

  “It would explain these sightings, though, if there were someone capable of imbuing objects with the power of unaided flight.”

  “All things can be explained through sorcery.”

  “Not sorcery. Only a sort of science beyond the understanding of our philosophers. You must admit, it is strange that this priest should be babbling about such things at a time like this.”

  “The priest has heard the same stories as we, no doubt. His presence at this momentous battle has obviously put him in an apocalyptic frame of mind. It would be unwise to draw conclusions from his rantings.”

  “Perhaps,” Ceolwulf said. “But… well, there must be some explanation for these sightings. Either they are portents of something or they are evidence of a kind of science that is beyond our ken. Either way, it would behoove us to look into them, would it not?”

  “You suggest I speak to this mad priest.”

  “I suggest that if he is mad, you will but waste a few minutes of your time. If he is not, you may gain some insight. If you intend to speak to him, I’d suggest you go to the abbey without delay. The man is not long for this world.”

  *****

  The priest, Osric, was weak and pale, having received a mortal belly wound, and his voice was weak, but he spoke coherently, at least at first. He lay on a couch in a small room in the rectory, clutching a stained wad of cloths against his abdomen, as Edward and Ceolwulf sat nearby.

  “I was wrong to have aided them,” Osric said, so softly that Edward had to lean in to hear him. “It was a test, and I failed. I thought I could redeem them, but I was wrong. I am being punished for my pride now. When I heard that the Saxons were coming, I knew I would die here.”

  “Is that why you attacked my men?” Ceolwulf asked.

  “Did I?” Osric asked. With some effort, he focused his eyes on Ceolwulf. “I was… agitated. I’ve not had a full night’s sleep in weeks. I never expected to make it to England, and I half-expected the Danes to murder me when I arrived. Then I heard the Saxons were on the march, and the monks fled. They entreated me to come with them, but I was in no condition to run, so I stayed behind. I waited in the abbey until the door was flung open and men ran inside. I… I suppose I panicked.”

  “Then you did not intend my knights to kill you?”

  “I… forgive me, I don’t know what I intended. Perhaps I did.”

  “Whom did you aid, Osric?” Ceolwulf asked. “The Dvergar?”

  “Dvergar…” Osric repeated, now staring blankly at the ceiling. “Some call them that, I understand. They are only men, though men with… knowledge that no other men have. They know how to do things that I thought impossible. Things that should be impossible. The… province of the Almighty God Himself.”

  “What sorts of things?” Edward asked.

  “They build… machines. Terrible machines that… dig and drill and grind and cut. Before I ran, I saw a machine that flew.”

  Ceolwulf glanced at Edward, who remained stony-faced.

  “Where are these people?” Edward asked. “What do they want?”

  “A place called… Svartalfheim, in the southeast of the island you call Iceland. Beyond a village called Höfn.”

  “You were a prisoner at this place?”

  “A prisoner? No, I… I was a teacher. I thought… I tried to teach them. I thought I had been called to redeem their efforts for the Lord, but… something happened. A terrible thing, yes, but the scales fell from my eyes. I see now, this thing they are doing, this project.” For a moment, Osric’s voice grew stronger and his eyes focused on Edward. “It is madness! If the Lord struck down the Tower of Babel for mankind’s pride, then what will he do to these people? It is terrible to contemplate!” Osric winced and closed his eyes as if in great pain. Tears rolled down his cheeks.

  “What is this project you speak of?” Edward asked.

  After some time, Osric opened his eyes and spoke again. “I tried to tell the monks, but they… believed me to be addled from my voyage. I was very tired and frightened. But I spoke the truth. The Pope. Is it still Sergius? He has to be told!”

  “Told what, Osric?” Ceolwulf asked.

  “Wha
t they are doing. At Svartalfheim. They make terrible weapons for waging war on men. And the rockets. It is an assault on heaven itself!”

  “You speak of the fiery portents in the sky?” Edward said.

  “Portents, yes,” Osric said, his eye closing. “Portents of war and destruction. Could it ever have been anything different? I was a fool to think it. Such power in the hands of those….” Osric’s words became an incomprehensible murmur.

  “Osric!” Edward said. “Speak to us. What are these people planning? Do they mean to attack England?”

  “England,” Osric murmured. “England is nothing to them. They will conquer all of Christendom and then heaven itself. The seven daughters of Atlas, sprawled at their feet. You must tell him. You must tell him. I failed, in my pride. But Rome… Rome must know. Forgive me….”

  Osric’s words turned to a murmur again, and he soon lost consciousness. Ceolwulf put his hand on the priest’s shoulder to try to rouse him, but Edward shook his head. “We will learn nothing more from him,” the king said. “Leave him be.”

  “I had hoped he would explain the missiles,” Ceolwulf said. “We know nothing more of them than we did an hour ago.”

  “But we know where your Dvergar live.”

  “You are convinced then?”

  Edward shrugged. “I’m convinced this priest spent some time among a people in Iceland who possess knowledge that we do not. Call them men or Dvergar, call it philosophy or sorcery, it makes no difference to me.”

  “What do you make of his talk of an assault on heaven?”

  “Allegory or delirium. Who can say? If half of what he says is true, though, these people are a threat to England and perhaps all of Christendom. I would like at least some independent confirmation, though, before I pursue the matter further. I shall make some inquiries with the bishops to determine whether a priest named Osric went missing.”